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sanity

I am reasonably certain, he said,that they are weaving a rugin the next room, a large one,I imagine, or at least a wall tapestry.It should be a medieval scene, dogs,a knight or gentleman, a child or two,and in the center a beautiful woman.Actually, if they are weaving it for me,I don’t care about the dogs, knightsor children, as long as she is beautiful.Until they are done, I will just dreamof what they are doing for mein the dark room at the end of the hall.

He asked her what she did, andthe question surprised her. Mostdidn’t ask that until much later on,but she replied, “I am a historian.”He said, “Isn’t that an odd profession,”quickly adding, “and I don’t mean for a woman.”“It is,” she smiled, “but I fell in lovewith history as a young girl, and I’ve been fortunate to watchstars being born and die, galaxies appearas if from nowhere, seen eventsthat happened before our own sun was born.”She could see he was confused, perhapsthat he thought her mad as others had.She calmly added, “You understand,I am an astronomer and all I seeis the history of our universe.”

(*Be forewarned, this is a shift from the usual post. On December 14, 1992 there was a shooting on the campus of Simon’s Rock College of Bard. A professor and student died, four others (my son included) were seriously wounded. Twenty years to the day later, in Connecticut 26 people died in a shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School. Since then there have been so many, many other mass shootings in our country. This is in honor of all the victims, alive and departed.)

— In memory of Galen Gibson and Nacunan Saez, victims of a greater insanity, December 14, 1992

It was a night much like thisbut for a quarter century’s slow elapse.It was a place much like thisresting beneath freshly fallen snow. The solution is quite simple He wrote, we need only round them up, ship them to the desert. If AIDS doesn’t take them in ten years, we can finish the job then.

It was a night much like thisHis “then” has come but thereis no job left for Him to finish He offered them up as a sacrifice to His god Tonight they have no body to offer to our tongues, no blood for our lips. We have only settled ground of barren altars outside Buenos Aires, in a snow shrouded Gloucester. We have no icons through which to channel our prayer save the flattened lead slugs the earth rejects.

It was a night much like this but Galen’s blood no longer stains the snow piled along side the library door, there are no shards of windshield, bits of skull where Nacuñan looked momentarily into His eyes. There is no blood tonight on the stairs to my son’s apartment nor on the dormitory stairs he limped that night to escape what he could not see his legs rejecting him.

It was a night much like this one but the walls are bare there are no gurneys pressed against the wall, gurneys I needed to believe, convinced myself, were starched sheet covered supplies.

In my dream last night, I was lostin a city of mostly dogs, but what was oddis that they were all standard poodleswho only wanted to lick my hand and cheek.I tell you this not because the dream was unusual, it was in fact rather mundane.I didn’t awaken with a damp face,and there was no indication I had been visited by a dog’s tongue.I tell you this because you mustimagine how truly strange it wasfor all of those dogs to meet but a single human lost in a dreamthat they couldn’t hope to comprehend.

He is certain he has the answerand is imply waiting for someoneto ask the correct question. He knows he cannot be wrongFor if the answer seems soit is only because the wrongquestion was asked, and thatwould hardly be his fault. He tells people this, asking that they carefully considerwhat the right question would be. Eventually someone alwaysgets it right, merely asks“Are you crazy?” to whichhe responds, “isn’t it obvious?”